The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys

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To Central

July 13, 2011 / / 4 Comments

I can’t adequately express to you the excitement we’re experiencing, nor the tremendous anticipation we’re feeling, for what our God has in store for us together. There’s no doubt in our minds that our Lord has brought us together at this time for very specific reasons. And we really can’t wait to join you in doing his work and his will together in Amarillo.

We’re so thankful for the faith and confidence you’ve placed in me and my family to represent our Lord and his Church at Central. That blessing and responsibility are not lost on us. It is sacred to us. We respect it. We cherish. And we’re going to keep it. This is so much bigger than all of us. We know that anything and everything that happens through me or through us together at Central is only our God using us to his glory and to the glory of his Kingdom.

Thank you so much for the warm welcome you’re already giving us. By 2:00 Sunday afternoon, I already had more than 30 emails and voice mails and text messages from our new family at Central, more than half of them from people we haven’t even met yet. And the encouragement and offers of assistance and friendly ‘hellos’ keep coming in. We can feel the excitement up there all the way down here. And it gives us great hope while we dwell among all these moving boxes and sad goodbyes. Each trip up there, every person we’ve met, has been a great blessing to us. Your kindness and generosity is overwhelming. We’re so ready to meet all of you and start returning the favors. And we’re looking forward to many years of faithful service together at Central.

“I long to see you so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to make you strong — that is, that you and I may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith.” ~Romans 1:11-12

Be assured that each of you and your families are in our constant prayers. Please be in fervent prayer for us as we prepare to join the Central Church of Christ. May our God bless us. And may he bless our efforts to partner with him in the redemption of his world.

Your servant in the grace and truth of Christ Jesus,

Allan

To Legacy

July 11, 2011 / / 9 Comments

My family and I will always listen for God’s voice. We will always follow his way. We will always answer his call. Through prayer and study and meditation and reflection and conversation, we will always be receptive to our Father’s leading.

Over the past several months it has become very clear to me that I cannot remain as the preaching minister at the Legacy Church of Christ. God has made it evident in some very surprising ways and in some ways that have been building for quite some time. So, again, after many weeks and months of difficult discernment, we have made the hard decision to leave our family at Legacy.

At the same time, our faithful Father has opened a door of tremendous opportunity for us in Amarillo. I have accepted the role of preaching minister at the Central Church of Christ and will begin my work there in September. Central is a downtown church with a downtown mindset, determined to reach its downtown community with the love of our Savior. They are driven by the mission to take Jesus to all peoples, all cultures, all languages, all tax brackets. That church seems to be defined by sacrificial service to others in the name of Jesus. They are committed to the arduous task of making their congregation reflect the Gospel nature of the all-inclusive table of our Lord. And most of you reading this blog know how attractive that is to me.

Of course, we leave Legacy with a great deal of sadness. My heart is heavy. I’ll forever be indebted to Legacy for showing such a tremendous faith in our God in bringing me here in the first place. Five years ago, you had absolutely no reason to have any faith in me. Your faith was obviously in our Father. And I thank you. You have nurtured me. You have supported me, encouraged me, and walked with me. You’ve shown great patience with me. And understanding. You’ve helped me.  Since day one, you’ve lovingly embraced my whole family. There are hundreds of you who have touched Carrie-Anne and me and our girls in profound and eternal ways. I have never felt for one minute that I was not loved at Legacy. We love you, too. A bunch.

Now, this is not the end of the world for me or for Legacy. It’s not like I’m leaving ministry. I’m not going back into radio. We are all still involved together in the great work of the Kingdom of our God. We still belong to the same Church of God. We’re still on the same board, working for the same mission and goals; I’m just moving to a different square.

As for Legacy, I’m convinced that this is the right move. I did not establish this church. And neither did you. This church was cruising along for almost fifty years before I got here and it’ll be just fine for fifty or five-hundred years after I’m gone. God established this congregation and he put it right here on Mid-Cities Boulevard for his specific purposes. He placed Legacy right where it is to be a light to this community. He placed it here so people in Northeast Tarrant County will find forgiveness and mercy and grace and love. He put Legacy right here in order to reach the lost, in order to comfort and bless and save. I firmly believe that our Father already knows the next Legacy preacher. This guy is a devoted man of God. And he will, by God’s grace and the power of the Holy Spirit, take Legacy to places I wouldn’t be able to. My prayer is that, with this man, my brothers and sisters here will embrace God’s vision and identify God’s holy mission for Legacy and jump into it with everything you’ve got. And turn everything rightside up for Christ.

I’m leaving Saturday for a four-day speaking engagement at the Northside Church in Benton, Arkansas where my great friend Jim Gardner preaches. So I won’t be here this Sunday. My shepherds here at Legacy have graciously allowed me a last opportunity to preach here at Legacy on July 24. I wanted the final chance to encourage you, to bless you, to affirm my great love for you, and to remind you of God’s marvelous plans for you.

You and each of your families and the entire Legacy family are in my constant prayers. Please keep us in yours.

May our God’s will be done at Legacy just as it is in heaven.

I love you,

Allan

Everybody a Preacher

July 8, 2011 / / 1 Comment

Day of Pentecost. Acts 2. There’s this mob in the street demanding an explanation for what’s happening in the upper room with the noise and the tongues of fire and the different languages. And Peter starts preaching from a passage in Joel:

I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
your old men will dream dreams.
Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days,
and they will prophesy.
~Acts 2:17-18 (from Joel 2:28-29)

Through most of our history with God, Holy Spirit empowered talk (preaching) has been limited to a few select prophets. But when Christ comes, when the day of the Messiah and the coming of the Kingdom of God arrives, God’s Holy Spirit will be poured out on everybody! Young and old, men and women, rich and poor, educated and not, people who’ve never stood up to speak before, people who’ve never even looked at a microphone before, all God’s people will speak up and speak out. Everyone will preach the truth. Everybody’s a preacher! We are living right now today in the age of this promised free speech.

That’s why Jesus’ people are always big talkers. Have you noticed? We’ll talk to anybody. We love to talk. And we won’t shut up. No matter what our neighbors say. No matter what the government says.

Jesus was a preacher. And he sends his disciples out to preach. Faith comes from what is heard. That’s why when we get together on Sundays we mostly talk and shout and sing and read and speak. The most difficult part of my Sunday morning is standing before the crowd at Legacy at 10:00 and trying to get everybody quiet. We love to talk. And we won’t shut up. About Jesus. Because we’re all preachers, filled with the Spirit of Christ, re-created to proclaim the Gospel of salvation in all its eternal glory.

One of my favorite parables of Jesus, the preacher, is about the sower who went forth to sow. What’s the Kingdom of God like? A farmer goes out and just starts slinging seed. Hey, it’s the Kingdom of God! And he’s just throwing seed everywhere. Wasting lots of good seed with a reckless abandon.

That sounds like a really lousy way to grow a crop of wheat. But Jesus says it’s the best way to spread the good news. May our God bless us as we refuse to shut up.

Peace,

Allan

Back To Work

July 7, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Yesterday was really more of a catch-up day. Today, I really am back to work. Today I’m in my study. Working. While you’re slaving away at the office or the construction site or the airport or the hospital, I’m at the church building doing God’s work. Right?

WRONG!

We are all doing God’s work, together, seven days a week.

Sometimes we speak in ways that make what I do as a preacher “full-time Christian work” and what you do as a member of the Body of Christ “part-time Christian work” or “weekend Christian work.” You must know that you are a full-time Christian banker or plumber or homemaker. You are a full-time Christian truck driver or repair man, administrator or salesperson. When we are at our work, we are at the same time at God’s work. Just like our Lord Jesus.

You realize that most of what Jesus did he did in a secular workplace: in a farmer’s field, in a fishing boat, at a wedding feast, in a cemetery, at a public well, on a country hillside, in a court room, at dinner with friends and family. Sometimes in the Gospels, Jesus shows up in a synagogue or at the temple. But he mostly spends time in the workplace.

John identifies Jesus as a worker 27 times in his Gospel. He quotes our Lord as saying, “My Father is still working, and I also am working.”

You work does not take you away from God; it continues the work of God. God is always in his workplace, your workplace, working. And once we recognize that, we more easily see ourselves — all of us — working in our workplaces in the name of Jesus to his eternal glory and praise.

Peace,

Allan

John Denver Would Have Been Proud

July 6, 2011 / / 2 Comments

After a little over a week in colorful, and much cooler, Colorado, I’m back in my study today. You know, a guy could really get used to 90-degrees at 5:00 in the afternoon instead of 90-degrees at 5:00 in the morning like it is here. So we came back home as fast as we could. We didn’t want to get spoiled.

Please indulge me while I post a few vacation pictures. These are mostly for my mom in Liberty City and my sister, Rhonda, in Edmond.

We spent the whole first day at Royal Gorge. We took the tram across the canyon and the inclined railroad to the bottom. We walked the length of the bridge — Carrie-Anne took baby steps and never ventured on either side of the yellow line down the middle — and even drove the mini-van across and back. But the highlight was the SkyCoaster: a giant rubber band that drops its riders in a 200 foot free fall and then swings them out over the canyon, suspending them more than 1,100 feet above the Arkansas River below. Whitney and I did it together. What a rush! I made myself hoarse from screaming. She almost passed out. No pictures of the SkyCoaster ride. I’m trying to figure out how to post the video. Stand by.

We climbed all 224-steps to the top of Seven Falls and did some hiking on the trails above. We took in the Air Force Academy, spending a lot of time flipping through the song books in the beautiful chapel and listening to the grunting of new cadets being trained to kill just on the other side of the stained glass. Weird juxtaposition. The Manitou Cliff Dwellings were a bit of a disappointment. There seemed to be a lot more of it in the brochure.

But the drive up and down Pikes Peak exceeded expectations. It rained on us the whole way up, some of it freezing on the windshield wipers. And the Town and Country did us right, hairpin turn after hairpin turn on the edge of oblivion. Most of it paved. No guardrails. Hundreds of feet straight down. Very cool. Of course, Carrie-Anne needs to have the passenger seat arm rest surgically removed from her hand. She doesn’t do Colorado very well. Carley and I built a tiny little snowman near the top. It was 41-degrees up there. And I got dizzy. I couldn’t tell if it was the altitude or the money we spent on cold burgers and flat fries.

Garden of the Gods was beautiful. We climbed those huge red rocks together for half a day. We all agreed that Cave of the Winds was boring. But the ropes course that extended over the cliff of the canyon was really great. An extra bonus we hadn’t really counted on. Valerie negotiated every level with no hands. It’s amazing what confidence you have and the things you can do when you have a safety harness. I think there’s probably a sermon in there somewhere.

On the way home we stopped in Amarillo to take in the July 4th “Texas” show at the Palo Duro Canyon (that’s your cue, Ro!) and didn’t leave Tuesday until we had made our marks at Cadillac Ranch.

We experienced a couple of thunderstorms, ate some questionable Mexican food, ignored “No Climbing” signs, and saw more squirrels and chipmunks than we could possibly count. We bought 85-octane gas instead of 87; we chose Karen as the voice of choice for our new GPS; we were forced to place a one-night “Your Face!” moratorium on the girls; and our hotel in Amarillo smelled like Schlitterbahn. We sang and we laughed and we talked and we prayed. We played silly games. We ate every meal together and fell asleep in the same room at the same time every night. I’m not sure how many more of these we’re going to be blessed to do as a family. I always hope for at least one more.

Peace,

Allan

Sabbatical

June 29, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Hello, from Colorful Colorado. We’re on the summer family vacation and I’ve promised I won’t blog until we return to the Great State of Texas on July 6.

Grace and Peace,

Allan

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